Recently, Stacksky.biz website surfaced, promoting itself as a platform where you can safely store cryptocurrency and other assets. I managed to gather credible supporting information that clearly indicates it is, in truth, a deceptive platform.
Regardless of the promises of the most easy, dependable, and client-friendly service, Stacksky.biz does not follow any of them. In fact, all this is just a gilded wrap around a clear scam, which takes your funds and never gives them back. Any stories about bonuses, endorsement from celebrities etc are nowhere to be found as well.
Stacksky Scam Overview
Originally, Stacksky poses as a crypto trading & cryptowallet platform with remarkably low commission fees. Another notable selling point for this site is partnerships with celebrities that have relation to the crypto world. Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Vitalii Buterin, Warren Buffet – the site claims having significant support from them. To make these claims look real, con actors use AI-generated videos with those celebs promote the scam as if it was the best thing in the world. For known reasons, Elon Musk is the most common choise for that. But, as I mentioned above, all this is just a blatant wrap around a transparent scam.
Stacksky Scam
Initially, Stacksky copies the layout of many equivalent online platforms. There are quite a few examples, like Resfulle, Monelax or Nelomia. They are entirely indistinguishable in terms of visual elements, with small discrepancies in the site header. Other details, and sometimes even crypto wallet addresses, are matching. Most likely, all these scam sites are managed by the same gang of fraudsters.
Cryptocurrency Scam Summary
| Website | Stacksky.biz |
| Hosting | AS13335 Cloudflare, Inc. United States, San Francisco |
| IP Address | 104.21.30.10 |
| Threat Type | Scam/Fraud |
| Scam Type | Fraudulent offers of cryptocurrency services |
How the Stacksky Scam Works?
Stacksky is a part of a significant cryptocurrency scam scheme that started circulating actively in 2023. Swindlers who stand behind it use several website designs, which still share the similar overall layout. Another shared element are the ways the scams like NAME are promoted, and the manner all this ends up to the victim of the scam. To reach peak efficiency, frauds apply advanced psychological tricks that make the user believe in the validity of the website. But let’s review them one by one.
Step 1: Promotion
To start the scam, criminals set up and fill accounts on popular social media platforms. They generally target Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. Subsequently, the advertising campaign commences. Utilizing bots and sponsored ads (when possible), fraud actors intensify the exposure of their fraudulent activities to possible victims. And as I said, fraudsters do not shy away using generative AI for creating videos with the aforementioned celebs that promote their scam to the public. To boost the folks even more, swindlers claim the bonus for every user who enrolls the service immediately.
Promotions of cryptoscams like Stacksky in TikTok. Most of these videos are AI-generated deepfakes
Step 2: Gaining Traffic
After following the ads, targets end up on a page filled with enticing offers. “Crypto starts with Stacksky”, “Your crypto savings are secured with Stacksky, “Start earning with Stacksky – they look rather reliable. To heat up users and make them proceed to step 3, crooks say that getting the promoted bonus requires registration. And as nothing questionable happens at this point, unexperienced users happily move on – especially since the bonus appears to be right behind the corner.
At this point, it is possible to get away from the scam without any losses. Before you register using your personal data, crooks will not earn even a nickel from your presence on the website.
Step 3: Data Gathering
This is the starting poing of the main fraud action. As I just mentioned, deceivers bait folks for registration with bonuses. And all the personal info needed for it – email, username, crypto wallet address – is valuable for user identification. Only by gathering this data and selling it further into the Darknet, crooks can earn quite a penny. Still, their plans go much further.
As it turns out, the promised bonus is not available to use right away. To make it at least usable for cryptocurrency purchases, the user should top up the account with the sum of a bonus. And this is what starts the final step of the scam.
Step 4: Requesting funds
Obviously, any crypto operations require you to have funds on your account. With Stacksky, users are also forced to top up to get the bonuses. And this is what creates the majority of the money flow to this scam site. By topping up the account, users hope to get the promised gift (usually $500-1000 in USDT), and may start trading on this site hoping to use all the transferred funds and withdraw them.
This, however, is where the first obvious issues start to surface. When comparing the actual crypto wallet vs what the site says, you can spot that no transactions are done whatsoever. And then, when you’d try to retrieve the funds from your account, the scam is finally uncovered to the user.
Step 5: Escaping from Funds Withdrawal
Needless to say that swindlers are naught on intentions to return your money. Though to make the denial look more legitimate, they’ve made up a whole bunch of reasons to decline the wireout request. Most of them repeat what KYC guidelines say, but for the Stacksky.biz they are here exclusively to make the wireout impossible.
By asking for your personal data, frauds just stall hoping for you to accept the loss and stop contacting them. If you don’t – well, there are multiple other checks you would desperately need to undergo before getting your money back. And every check will uncover more and more information, which – you guessed it right – will be then traded on the Darknet. Never reveal your real info to strangers!
Signs of Scam
I gathered several facts that point at the scammy nature of the Stacksky.biz. Actually, there are a lot of scams that fall under the same points, so they are pretty much universal.
- Absent company details. Stacksky does not provide any documentation about its ownership, location or registration. No legitimate contact details are given either. Moreover, it appears that the domain and all social network pages were registered quite recently.
- Fake sponsorship from a celebrity. Scams like Stacksky like to pick a celebrity as a sponsor of this entire campaign. For obvious reasons, fraudsters generally choose Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mr. Beast, Mark Zuckerberg, and similar celebrities. They do not disdain claiming partnership with a company as well. Even though Coinbase, Binance or MetaMask never heard of Stacksky, they do not care – this creates a halo of credibility.
- Potential Ponzi Scheme. The scam relies on a Ponzi-like referral system to spread reach through social media. In fact, only the first members will receive the payoff, at the cost of the money brought by other members.
- Hype without facts. Frauds can cheer up their victims from time to time, using claims about non-existent events. “We got contracts with Coinbase”, “Elon Musk mentioned us as the most prolific crypto project” – you could likely hear something like that. This is made to make people believe in their money return. This can be the sauce to make people top-up their accounts once again.
- Crypto-only incoming payments. Whether the user tries to top-up the account, hackers will only accept payments in crypto – no bank transfers or other payment methods. Such an approach completely hides the identity of the company and deprives you of the ability to ask for a refund.
- Claims are too good to be true. Let’s be sane and sober: even in crypto space, there are not many places where you can earn 50-100-200%. Being able to participate in all of them is nearly impossible, as well as it is impossible to insure or hedge all the risks. Even by that reason alone I can tell that the Stacksky is a definite scam.
What Should I do as a Victim?
If you had to deal with Stacksky site and fell victim to that scam, there are still some steps to take. They will make further scam attempts harder, and also boost the knowledge about that scam among folks.
- Report the scam to authorities. Search for local authorities responsible for financial frauds, and also notify wallet providers and social networks via their tech support. It is essential to make the further operations of these scammers much harder.
- Tell your close friends. That step is similar to reporting to the authorities, and has similar effects. By posting info about scam crypto service, you decrease the pool of people they can fool.
- Get evidence. Screenshot or save all the information related to the website. URL, screenshot of a main page, login window, EULA, account top-up menu, wallet addresses – all these things may be useful for authorities to find the scammers.
- Check whether you can ask for a refund. As I’ve said above, crypto payments do not fall under refund policies in most banks. Nonetheless, in some circumstances, it is still possible. Never lose hope until you actually confirm it is gone.
- Make your mistake your lesson. Financial losses are always a reason for frustration, but let’s imagine it was a pay for scam revealing courses. Remember the key features of these crypto scam sites, the way they attract people and what they promise. In the future, you will easily recognize a trap of spending no money.
Scan your system for possible malware infections
Beware of cross scams! Scam actors can use your trust to make you download some stuff or interact with certain documents. It may be a trap that installs malware to your system. There are no moral barriers or limits for these scoundrels.
Throughout the timeline of the scam, its masters may reach out to you with particular files. Alternatively, they may offer you to set up “cryptocurrency wallet applications” or “browser extensions” to facilitate access to your cryptocurrency assets. As we earlier figured out, these scoundrels have no plan of restoring your funds. So, what can these emails and browser plugins represent? Correct – that is another component of the deceptive plan designed to throw you into willingly installing malicious programs onto your computer.
Both extensions and files included to email messages can act as a carrier for various malicious code. In this scenario, I foresee the presence of spyware and stealers among all kinds of malware. While it is not mandatory for scammers to distribute malware, the likelihood is always significant. As previously mentioned, their ethics is of no concern, and their reputation is already neck deep in mud. They have no principles to lose and aim to maximize revenues.
